Reader recommended

What are you reading, watching, wearing or doing that’s so great you want to share it with others? We asked a few of our Insight readers, and this is what they said.

— Compiled by Insight Editor Margaret LeBrun

THE 29-MINUTE MEETING

“I recommend the 29-minute meeting format we use with our clients. We purposely chose 29 minutes so that it doesn’t go over. If you say 30, it becomes 35 or 40 or 45. It forces you to stop at a designated time.”

Cheryl Perkins, CEO, Innovationedge, Neenah

EASY MEALS FOR BUSY EXECS

“I highly recommend the Tasty app.For a working mom of three (well, now one is off at college), I do not have time to put extravagant meals together. Tasty meets the bill with respect to creative and easy meal plans. The video tutorials are the best and it is pretty difficult to mess up.

“My only frustration it is that I have to press rewind multiple times because the videos are way too fast to follow.
I have been known to flip my iPhone or iPad off the counter trying to balance the video while measuring ingredients simultaneously!(Also, my dishes never turn out as pretty but, hey, that’s OK. My kids never starve.)”

Trisha Lemery, president and CEO, Winsert, Marinette

15 MINUTES OF POSITIVITY

“A favorite new book is ‘Little Gold Book of YES! Attitude’ by Jeffrey Gitomers. It’s such a simple and profound principle: 15 little minutes a day reading or listening to something positive! Our people and our businesses deserve this from us. I loved this quick read so much I bought it for everyone on our leadership team.”

Vicki Wilson, president and founder, Door County Coffee & Tea

WILL ROBOTS TAKE YOUR JOB?

“A quick activity to check out your career prospects in the age of artificial intelligence: Go to willrobotstakemyjob.comand enter your profession or the line of work your kids intend to pursue. The site will tell you how much at risk the job is. Will you be ‘totally safe’ or ‘doomed’ or somewhere in between. Additional valuable info is displayed for every job.”

Oliver Buechse, co-founder, Advancing AI Wisconsin

GET THE PHONE!

“My productivity tip: pick up the phone. It’s not as glamorous as an IM, a tweet or even an email, but nothing replaces an old-fashioned, real-time conversation. My favorite situation is an email string of six or seven exchanges carbon-copied to multiple people that never solves a problem or enlightens the multitudes. It takes days for all parties to weigh in when one phone call or face-to-face exchange could resolve the issue in minutes. Just because you can use technology doesn’t mean you should.”